Saturday, June 18, 2016

BIBLE: Genesis (Adam and Eve, Freud and Marx)

Genesis
deals with the creation of heaven and earth.We’re told that “the Spirit of God moved” and everything in the universe
came into existence.How did it
happen?“God said, let there be light:
and there was light.”God didn’t think about
light and then somehow it came into existence on its own.He spoke it into existence.Then an interesting thing happens.“God saw the light, that it was good.”God didn’t say light was good.He saw that it was good.Somehow this Spirit, which doesn’t have a
mouth, can talk.This same Spirit, which
doesn’t have eyes, can see.This is
exactly the sort of thing Freud complains about when he says “the common man
cannot imagine God otherwise than in the figure of an enormously exalted father.”
(Civilization and Its Discontents, GB1)Freud thinks religion takes a human image and projects it outward onto
some vague Cosmic Being with enormous power.That’s the opposite of what Genesis says: “God said, Let us make man in
our image, after our likeness.”Freud
says Man created “god” in our image.Genesis says God created Man in his image.Freud’s view is humanistic and thinks Man is
the measure of all things.Genesis is
theistic and teaches God was at the beginning of creation and remains at the
center of all things.

Marx
has a similar complaint but with a slightly different emphasis.In Genesis God says to Adam “Of every tree of
the garden thou mayest freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and
evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou
shalt surely die.” That’s not what the
serpent says.He tells Eve “Ye shall not
surely die.For God doth know that in
the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as
gods, knowing good and evil.”These are
two very different messages.Adam and
Eve are given a choice between good and evil.They choose wrong and their decision is called The Fall of Man because according
to Genesis that’s how evil came into the world.This is exactly the sort of thing Marx complains about when he says
“theology explains the origin of evil by the fall of man, that is, it asserts
as historical fact what it should explain.”Marx wants rational explanations and rejects Genesis because he doesn’t
think it is an “historical fact.” Somewhat like Adam and Eve, readers are left to
choose between a poetic story and Marx’s preference for rational analysis.

Given
two starkly different alternatives how should GB readers choose?Compare notes.The GB method is to consider alternatives by
comparing what other GB authors have to say.Aristotle wasn’t talking about Genesis but he had this to say: “if it is
true that intelligence is divine in comparison with man, then a life guided by
intelligence is divine in comparison with human life. We must not follow those
who advise us to have human thoughts, since we are only human, and mortal
thoughts, as mortals should.” (On Happiness, GB1)This quote doesn’t suggest that Genesis was
right or Freud was right or Marx was right.Aristotle is merely emphasizing how important it is to use our intelligence
wisely.Reason is a powerful tool.That’s why Marx thinks we should use it to
explain things rationally.Genesis agrees
that Reason is powerful but for that very reason we should be careful how we
use it.Power can be intoxicating and
lead us down the wrong path.Genesis
tells us Eve “saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to
the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one wise.”Health, beauty and wisdom look like good
things.What rational person is against
health, beauty and wisdom?Marx and
Freud both think Man is the measure of all things but Genesis says God’s way is
best.Augustine (City of God, GB4) says
one path (Marx and Freud) leads us to the City of Man and the other (Genesis) leads to the City
of God.Which way is best and
how can we be certain?In the
Great Books nothing is certain.We can’t
even be certain that nothing is certain.